Reliable WiFi

Archive
1

I’m a trifle concerned about what I’ve seen posted by some users about the reliability of the RS21 WiFi module.

e.g. https://www.ghielectronics.com/community/forum/topic?id=13757

It seems there are known reliability issues in some aspects of the software associated with this device.

I’ve assumed that I can get a mainboard and a WiFi module and then be able to write and run TCP/IP Socket based client/server applications without any problems.

But there are reports of inexplicable exceptions arising when code tries to connect to some SSID and a need to use a repetitive connect retry loop until one eventually gets connected.

So I need to ask is this true?

I don’t want to invest time and money only to find that a released product has serious bugs, I’m assuming that a degree of stress, soak and regression testing is carried out as a matter of routine before releasing changed/new hardware/software - if so then surely something as fundamental as unreliable connectivity would have been picked up internally before releasing the RS21?

I need stable, reliable WiFi connectivity like I get from a laptop, smartphone or tablet - is this possible using Gadgeteer products?

Also can I politely suggest that GHI consider adding a section to the site that list “Known Issues” demarcated by hardware and software version? This would allow customers to peruse that list to see if an issue was important to them or not.

Thanks

B

2

Indeed so I’d like to know what bugs are [em]already[/em] identified before I invest rather than investing before I discover a bug that’s serious to me and prevents me from achieving my goals.

I don’t expect “bug free” anything but investing blind is foolish, one should always exercise due diligence before spending money and time I think.

B

3

I’d be interested in hearing from anyone who’s using an RS21 for an important application, to see if they’ve had any issues they deem to be serious.

For all I know there isn’t a serious issue and the report may stem from a hasty reaction when there were user factors at play.

B

4

@ Barraty - please keep in mind that many of the issues you see on the forum are from earlier beta releases of the software. As for the known issues, they are listed in the SDK release notes and over here https://www.ghielectronics.com/docs/227/post-release-issues

The issue @ andre.m pointed out is not confirmed yet, awaiting more info from the user. We were not able to reproduce it and no one else have reported it.